For the last two weeks the Craft’s Center class has been working on half round bird houses. Some of these, mine included, used as much as 25 lbs. of clay.They are large. The center one, which isn’t finished stands at 24″. We decided  to check with the technician to make sure it would fit into the electric bisque kiln. It will fit into the gas kiln. The class is in various stages, of completion, some of the first houses are bisque, some were left out of the kiln because of hair line cracks. So part of last

Mondays demonstration was how to fix the cracks using paper clay. The main demonstration was how to glaze the houses, because of their size the usual dipping method wasn’t going to work, so I showed them how to use a slip trailer to cover large areas without getting brush strokes or too thin of a coat. You also have to be concerned with getting the glaze too thick.

While doing the demonstration I was bragging on my Saturday morning class and one of the students asked if I brag on them to the class at my studio. She was teasing and of course I do, but Lora this for you. There is nothing more rewarding than to walk into the studio and see one to three of your students (out of six) working on their own time on the project you assigned. Every week this class is ready with questions they encountered, they’re there before I am, which is an hour before class time, and they are always happy and ready to start. Showing up to teach you is a highlight of my week and when my husband asks me, “How was class?” my answer is, “Great as usual.”

Here the students are seeing and touching their work for the first time. Learning what density of design worked well, getting familiar with the personalities of the glaze, and seeing which ones need to be applied thinner rather than thicker. Some chemicals puff up the water in the glaze making the application a bit more difficult than others. There’s a fine line, one I’ve often crossed, in thinning down a color to much and just enough. Probably one of the more intuitive things involved in my glazing process called, cuerda seca.

The squiggly lines on the left side of the four tile flower, bottom right, is called crazing. It’s usually caused by grease or dust on the surface of tile. I believe in this situation it was too thick of an application. In some cases it can accent the image by giving the pedals a more realistic look. But if the student or I (in my work) don’t like it, more glaze can be added and the tile can be re-fired. Most people don’t re-fire but I’ve had really good luck and results. The trick seems to be to have a long preheat before the kiln really gets going.

From the way students got to work and that a few have already come by this week to work on their glazing I’d say they’re having a pretty good time.

Last week we glazed and here are a few of the results.

One of three tiles Laurie glazed last Saturday.

Laurie's other two tiles.

This tile made by Ginger is carved and stamped. An iron rich glaze was brushed on and then wiped off leaving the impressions filled, she then went over the tile again with a pale green glaze.